Hot Topics:

Boulder News

Longmont still working with mobile home residents whom flood displaced

Royal Mobile Park nearly empty

By Victoria A.F. Camron

Times-Call staff writer

Posted:
07/06/2014 08:24:40 AM MDT

Updated:
07/07/2014 11:26:32 AM MDT

Please enable Javascript to watch this video

Around 3 a.m. Sept. 12, a Longmont police officer pounded on the door of Amanda Marshall's mobile home in Royal Mobile Park.

"I heard people running and I heard people yelling," she said Thursday.

The commotion frightened 12-year-old Kinsey, who was sleeping on the couch.

"I was afraid someone was breaking in," Kinsey said.

When Amanda Marshall opened the door, the officer said she had five minutes to pack some clothes, gather her children and leave because the nearby St. Vrain River was going to flood the home at 17 Prince St., about halfway between South Pratt Parkway and Main Street.

And the officer wasn't leaving the home until the family did.

"We were kind of dumbfounded," Amanda Marshall said.

Kinsey said, "I just stood there in shock. It was kind of weird."

Amanda Marshall took her work clothes and one change of clothing each for Kinsey and then-2-year-old Kaitlin.

"I was really thinking we were going to go back home," Marshall said.

They never would.

Almost 10 months later, the Royal Mobile Park — now owned by the city, which plans to use it for flood mitigation — is nearly empty. One mobile home remains, but it should be moved this week to St. Vrain Village on South Francis Street, said Tracy DeFrancesco, Longmont housing and community investment specialist.

"We're still working with several (residents) who have moved out but don't have permanent housing yet," DeFrancesco said Wednesday.

Members of 26 households are either renting or living with family members, and another five families are trying to get financing to purchase a new home, she said. Those five are either living with family members or staying in transitional housing.

Amanda Marshall stands with her daughters Kinsey, 12, and Kaitlin, 3, in the Prince Street lot at Royal Mobile Park where they lived until the St. Vrain River flooded on Sept. 12. (Lewis Geyer / Longmont Times-Call)

The city has spent $205,753 in federal Community Development Block Grant funds to help residents relocate, DeFrancesco said. That money went to down payment assistance ($114,300), moving mobile homes ($36,597), rental assistance ($28,934), moving residents' personal property ($19,322) and providing security deposits ($6,505), she said.

The CDBG money must be used by Sept 12 — a year after the flood.

To help four families who are undocumented immigrants, the city received $60,000 from the Longmont Community Foundation. Of that, the city has spent $43,736, DeFrancesco said.

The city paid $4,500 each to move 34 mobile homes to a landfill or to demolish on site the three that couldn't be moved, she said. That money did not come from the Community Development Block Grant funds, but DeFrancesco was not sure of the source.

Other housing programs will be available later this year, she said. Boulder County, including Longmont and Boulder, has been approved for a down-payment assistance program. The city also will offer housing rehabilitation funds for flooded properties, money to replace mobile homes and temporary rental assistance.

Royal Mobile Park by the numbers

The city of Longmont purchased the Royal Mobile Park, on the south side of Boston Avenue between South Pratt Parkway and Main Street, in December for $2.62 million. The city has been helping residents find new homes, and plans to use the site for flood mitigation.

56: Households at Royal Mobile Park before the Sept. 12 flood of the St. Vrain River

12: Households that stayed in Longmont and are renting or are without permanent housing

14: Households that moved out of Longmont and are renting or are without permanent housing

8: Households that purchased replacement homes inside Longmont

10: Households that purchased replacement homes outside Longmont

5: Households that moved their mobile homes to other parks inside Longmont

2: Households that moved their mobile homes to other parks outside Longmont

5: Households trying to purchase single-family homes

34: Mobile homes taken to a landfill

3: Double-wide mobile homes demolished on site because they were too big to move

Residents must meet various income limits for the different programs, and those living in mobile homes, the elderly and the disabled have priority in the programs, DeFrancesco said. Information and applications will be available later this month, and a 60-day application window will open after that, she said.

A total loss

Marshall bought the mobile home in July 2013. Her aunt and uncle, Glenda and Rick Sauer, managed Royal Mobile Park and lived in a house at the east end of Prince Street.

When Marshall returned to the mobile home park on Sept. 17, she found Kaitlin's first bicycle wrapped up in her aunt's fence. Before the flood, it had been secured in Marshall's shed, she said.

"That was hard to swallow. That was the first thing I saw," Marshall said.

Down the street, floodwater had moved her home off its foundation in two directions. The back end went one direction; the front end, the opposite way. The mobile home was split down the middle, she said.

She hadn't been inside.

"It took three grown men to get my door open," Marshall said. Although the mobile home sat 4 feet off the ground, 3 ½ feet of mud deposited inside, she said. Her washer and dryer filled with mud. The water took screens off her windows.

As she and others cleaned up, the floor beneath them buckled, she said.

"We were walking on beams," Marshall said.

Marshall recovered her television set, her dad's ashes and two plastic tubs of photos.

"Everything else was a total loss," Marshall said.

In the two weeks following the flood, three assessors valued her home at $10,000 and estimated the damage at $46,000. Only then did Marshall think about where she and her girls would live. They had been staying with Marshall's boyfriend, Jesse Bodah, and his two children in Bodah's two-bedroom apartment, a crowded situation that couldn't continue.

"I lucked out getting in here," Marshall said, sitting in the living room of her duplex on Donovan Place. Her friend who lives next door knew the place would be vacant, so Marshall snatched it up before it went on the market.

She and the girls moved in at the end of October, she said. Rent is $500 more a month than Marshall was paying for her mobile home, and the utilities cost more, she said. She used money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to pay the lease, but she'll have to move again, she said.

From the city, Marshall received $300 for the security deposit.

"I've gotten no help since then," she said. It's not clear if she's eligible for more aid, but she plans to contact the city and find out, she said.

Marshall was apprehensive about moving so close to the St. Vrain River, but her new home isn't in the flood plain, she said.

"I still panic when it rains a lot," she said.

Visiting Royal Mobile Park on Thursday, Marshall looked around at the debris, the broken concrete pad, the trees.

"It's crazy to think that our house was here," she said. "This yard, it was beautiful."

Kaitlin, who turned 3 in January, has had a hard time understanding what happened, her mother said.

MacIntyre feels Colorado is capable of making run at bowl gameCU BUFFS FALL CAMPWhen: 29 practices beginning Wednesday morning 8:30-11 a.m. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday practices are open to the media and public next week. Full Story

It didn't take long for Denver music observers to notice Plume Varia. Husband and wife Shon and Cherie Cobbs formed the band only two years ago, but after about a year they started finding themselves on best-of lists and playing the scene's top venues. Full Story